Combined supercritical-fluid chromatography/mass spectrometry in the analysis of diuron in plasma using on-line phase-system switching

On-line sample pretreatment by means of the phase-system switching approach is an interesting technique for the analysis of aqueous samples, e.g., plasma, by means of supercritical-fluid chromatography. In order to analyse plasma samples the following analytical procedure is used. The plasma sample is injected on to a short precolumn, which is washed with water and subsequently dried with nitrogen. Next, the solutes are desorbed with the supercritical mobile phase, analysed with packed-column supercritical-fluid chromatography and detected with either a UV detector or a mass spectrometer, equipped with a moving-belt interface. The herbicide diuron is selected as a test compound to study the feasibility of this approach. Using a selective detector the procedure is sufficiently sensitive to detect diuron in plasma, but not appropriate to detect the diuron metabolites in a post-mortem plasma sample. These have been identified with liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry. The detection limit of diuron in plasma using the procedure described is about 30 ng/mL.     

Effect of rare-earth oxides on the magnetic properties of anisotropic barium ferrites

The effect of rare-earth oxides on the properties of anisotropic barium ferrites has been studied by x-ray structural and Mössbauer methods. Additions of SrCO₃, as well as SrCO₃ and La₂O₃, SrCO₃ and Pr₆O₁₁, SrCO₃ and Nd₂O₃, SrCO₃ and Sm₂O₃ in amounts of 7.5 mole % Sr and 10 mole % rare-earth element to grade-A barium powder results in the substitution of barium ions by Sr and rare-earth ions; consequently, the energy of magnetic anisotropy changes and the technically important parameters B_r and (BH)_max increase.Translated from Izvestiya Vysshikh Uchebnykh Zavedenii, Fizika, No. 1, pp. 34–39, January, 1989.     

Role of Bulk Vaporization in the Dynamics of Laser-Induced Erosion Plumes of Metals

In different regimes of exposure of metals to pulsed laser radiation, we show the role played by the liquid-drop phase formed from the target material in a laser-induced erosion plume due to bulk vaporization, in the dynamics of this plume. For some metals, the ranges of power densities of the acting laser radiation, at which the condensed-phase particles influence the passage of laser radiation to the target surface, have been determined experimentally. The mechanism of realization of a low-threshold breakdown has been revealed.     

New insights on amorphous silicon-nitride microcavities

All amorphous silicon-nitride planar optical microcavities operating in the visible range have been grown by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition. The luminescence intensity of the N-rich silicon-nitride layer from a microcavity with 6 period distributed Bragg reflectors (DBRs) is two order of magnitude higher than that of the luminescent layer without the cavity. Moreover, a strong directionality of the microcavities emission can be observed. Such results can be ascribed to the anisotropic optical density of states induced in the Fabry–Perot structure. The quality factors of the resonators are strictly correlated to the number of periods of the DBRs.     

Two-Variable Identities in Groups and Lie Algebras

We study two-variable Engel-like relations and identities characterizing finite-dimensional solvable Lie algebras and, conjecturally, finite solvable groups and introduce some invariants of finite groups associated with such relations. Bibliography: 29 titles.     

A tight-binding study of LUMO states in ellipsoidal silicon nanocrystals

In this paper we report on tight-binding calculations of lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals states for silicon ellipsoidal nanocrystals. The electronic structure has been calculated for different nanocrystal shapes either keeping constant or varying the number of silicon atoms. We have found that changing the ellipsoid aspect ratio a non-obvious energy level structure is obtained. The implications for the infrared optical transitions and their relationship with the polarization of the radiation involved are discussed.     

A test problem for molecular dynamics integrators

We derive a test problem for evaluating the ability of time-steppingmethods to preserve the statistical properties of systems inmolecular dynamics. We consider a family of deterministic systemsconsisting of a finite number of particles interacting on acompact interval. The particles are given random initial conditionsand interact through instantaneous energy- and momentum-conservingcollisions. As the number of particles, the particle density,and the mean particle speed go to infinity, the trajectory ofa tracer particle is shown to converge to a stationary Gaussianstochastic process. We approximate this system by one describedby a system of ordinary differential equations and provide numericalevidence that it converges to the same stochastic process. Wesimulate the latter system with a variety of numerical integrators,including the symplectic Euler method, a fourth-order Runge-Kuttamethod, and an energyconserving step-and-project method. Weassess the methods' ability to recapture the system's limitingstatistics and observe that symplectic Euler performs significantlybetter than the others for comparable computational expense.     

Nuclear superstructure {1/2, 0, 1/2} of an La<Subscript>0.93</Subscript>Sr<Subscript>0.07</Subscript>MnO<Subscript>3</Subscript> manganite orthorhombic crystal

The {1/2, 0, 1/2} nuclear superstructure in an La_0.93Sr_0.07MnO₃ manganite orthorhombic crystal is revealed using thermal-neutron diffraction. It is demonstrated that this superlattice belongs to the class of distortion-type structures and is directly associated with a 1/16-type ordering of Mn⁴⁺ and Mn³⁺ ions in a collinear ferromagnetic phase of the La_0.93Sr_0.07MnO₃ manganite.     

Decay of neutron-rich Ga isotopes near N = 50 at PARRNe

The PARRNe facility has been used to produce neutron-rich isotopes ^83,84Gaby the ISOL method. Their decay has been studied, and β-γ coincidence and γ-γ coincidence data were collected as a function of time. The first two excited levels in ⁸³Ge and the first excited level in ⁸⁴Ge have been measured for the first time.     

Fixed points in the family of convex representations of a maximal monotone operator

Any maximal monotone operator can be characterized by a convex function. The family of such convex functions is invariant under a transformation connected with the Fenchel-Legendre conjugation. We prove that there exists a convex representation of the operator which is a fixed point of this conjugation.